Of course, you don't want to put your home on the market with no idea where you might be moving to - what if you sell straight away and end up homeless? Likewise, if you find the house of your dreams, you must sell your home quickly so you don't risk losing it to another buyer.

So what should you do for the best?

You could consider selling your property and moving into a rented home for a year or so while finding your dream home. However, this can be expensive, spending money on rent rather than paying off your mortgage. It could be hard to find a property to rent at the moment with the market the way that it is. There is enormous demand from tenants, and simply not enough properties available in the market. And what if the market changes whilst you are renting? What if the interest rates continue to rise and your mortgage becomes unaffordable, or the property prices increase, and you can no longer afford the property you wanted? For many, stepping off the property ladder is just not an option.

Juggling between selling and buying a property is almost inevitable. So you had better learn how to juggle!

Selling your home: You can't do anything without selling your home, so the first task is to get it on the market. It takes time to put the marketing materials together and get everything ready to launch, so there is no need to look at properties seriously just yet, although it might be fun to start looking at what is around.

Generating interest: Until you have interest in your property from buyers, there will be no sale, so you can rest easy and not worry about juggling much. In fact, if you fall in love with a property now, you might be disappointed because you are not ready to buy yet, so whilst it might be fun to keep an eye on the properties on the market, it is better not to look too seriously yet.

Offers: When you start receiving offers, your potential buyers will have a projected timeframe for when they intend to complete the sale. You can only agree to a timescale if you know where you are moving to and what the seller of that property will do. This is the time when you need to consider the property that you are going to buy. Time to go property shopping!

So, you accept an offer on your property and negotiate to buy your next home. The key to the juggle is the management of the sale and the related chain. And it all comes down to COMMUNICATION.

As with many things in life, not knowing what is going on can be frustrating and lead to increased stress levels for everyone involved. If you have no idea what is happening with the other parties in the chain, you will likely feel out of control. So, keep in touch with your agent, solicitor and financial advisor.

Regular contact with all parties, including updates to the rest of the chain, will ensure that everyone knows what is happening and when. This will keep everyone informed and updated with the process and in control of the situation.

Your agent is effectively the lynchpin of the whole operation. They can contact all buyers, sellers, and other agents in a chain so they can keep you fully informed of the status of your move. Keep in touch with them so that you reduce stress levels and keep up to date with what is happening. Then, when the time comes to coordinate your moving day, you and your buyers will be able to prepare accordingly so that no one is taken by surprise. The last thing you want is to be told you have to move in less than a week and for that update to come entirely out of the blue.

If you are considering moving house, the first task is to get your property on the market. Get in touch with our team of experts to get the ball rolling on your move to your dream home.